Stealth
by rcaqua
Summary: Someone is stalking Casey, but no one in the VenturiMacDonald house knows it. What happens when the stalker tries to take things one step too far? Will Derek be there to prevent it? [Dasey]
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer**: Don't own. Don't sue.

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**Chapter One**

The house was, for once, empty.

No one was scrambling to get out the door on time, to find their gear for practice, to get a raise on their allowance because the movie was in ten minutes and they were broke. In a household of seven people, it was hard to imagine a time when the house was completely silent.

Yet it was. Totally, blissfully, silent.

Casey took a moment to savor that word.

Silent, quiet; devoid of all noise, speech, and, most especially, Derek, who managed to disrupt the house just by breathing or, god forbid, smirking.

Oh, yes, today was a very good day.

And, on top of that, she had just finished her paper on Wuthering Heights, which put her three days ahead of schedule on her English homework. And that also meant that she had ample time to just _enjoy the silence_.

Casey had been waiting for this day all month. This was the day that George and Nora had designated Family Fun Night – Out. She shook her head just at the thought of it. Only her mother could come up with something that corny.

Casey was more than willing to forgive her mother any corniness, though, as it was also what had gotten her out of the hellish – to her mind, anyway – trip to the bowling alley for the "All Night Bowlathon." Translation: All Night Opportunity For Klutzilla To Strike Again. So not good.

Thankfully, Nora had been made to see reason. Well, it was more along the lines of "Derek gets to skip for a date. Why can't I stay home, too? I have actual work to do."

Of course, her parents had caved. And it was not like she had actually lied. She did have something important to do. Making herself a fruit smoothie was hard work. Really.

Okay, she might have lied a little. But really, Derek couldn't have all the fun. It would not be…equal. It was almost like Casey's responsibility to make sure that there was an equal male-female balance in perks for Edwin, Lizzie, and Marti to look up to.

Casey smiled at her smoothie. She would have to remember that to use on her mom sometime. Maybe she should write it down…

She hopped off her chair and started hunting around the kitchen for a piece of paper. She knew they kept a notepad by the fridge, but someone had managed to misplace it again.

"There is a reason I put the notepad in the same place every time I find it," she muttered to herself as she rooted around in the cabinet over the sink for it.

"Ha!" she exclaimed as her hand closed around it.

She pulled it out and considered doing a victory dance – hey, she was home alone – but decided against it. There were too many things in the kitchen that she could knock over and break.

She wasn't against humming as she walked back to the table. Luckily, Derek had left a pen there when he was writing his latest fling's address down on a napkin that morning.

Casey began to write her "devious plan" down with a flourish. She was halfway through the second sentence (just because it was a plan to get out of family gatherings did not mean it couldn't be properly punctuated) when she heard it.

Footsteps. In the living room.

She checked her watch uncertainly. It was barely after ten – the Bowlathon was just getting started. She doubted Derek would leave his latest girlfriend so early, either. His plans had not sounded like the standard dinner-and-a-movie combo. Unless it was an X-rated movie, anyway.

She was probably being paranoid, she told herself. There was no reason for her heart to be racing so fast, for her eyes to be frozen wide open, for her to be tense and coiled to spring from her chair and run as fast as she could in the opposite direction.

No reason at all.

"Derek?" she called out, trying to disguise the tremor in her voice. If he found out she had managed to frighten herself after trying so hard to get to stay home alone he would never let her live it down.

There was no answer.

She was sure of it, though. There was someone in the house. And that someone had just started getting a lot closer.

She jumped out of her chair and all but ran to the telephone.

_Please don't let him hear me. Please don't let him hear me_, she chanted in her mind.

She pulled the phone off the hook and started to dial. A hand closed around her wrist.

Casey screamed.

"Uh uh, honey," a man said, clapping a hand over her mouth. His voice was low, rough, the kind she'd heard in horror movies and laughed at.

She wasn't laughing now.

The man increased the pressure on her wrist until the phone dropped from her hand. He grasped both of her hands in one of his own and held them behind her back, twisting her arms painfully. He took his hand away from her mouth, but before she could scream she felt something sharp poking her in the back of the neck.

Casey grew cold with fear.

A knife. Oh god, he had a knife. She began to tremble.

"Please don't hurt me," she said.

Was that her voice? That squeaky, trembling thing? That couldn't be her voice, this couldn't be her body, because things like this just didn't happen to her.

The knife pressed harder into her skin. She let out a hiss of pain as it cut her, the blood welling from the cut instantly.

"You're not gonna scream," the man whispered in her ear. "You're not gonna run away. And you're not gonna do anything stupid or else you're gonna find out just what I can do to you when I get angry."

Casey began to sob.

The man pulled something from his pocket and set it on the counter behind them. Then he pushed her forward, one rough hand ripping her shirt half off. Another tug finished the job.

"Please, please, please, _please_," Casey pleaded. "Don't do this. Oh god, please don't do this. We – we have money and – and computers and stuff. Take it, take all of it! Just please go away. Please, please, _please_."

She was deteriorating into a crying mess, great hiccupy sobs leaving her throat. The knife's deadly presence at the base of her skull only served to make things worse.

The man backhanded her viciously. Her head flung back and hit the counter.

"Quit that," he ground out. "Makes you look bad for the camera."

Camera? What camera?

Casey spied it sitting on the counter. Her sobs began to increase.

The world was spinning in circles. She could barely see through the tears. That made it slightly better; it was like she wasn't even there, like she was watching someone else being attacked, but she couldn't do anything to help.

The man grabbed her breast roughly, practically ripping her bra off in his haste to grope her. Casey stared down at his hand, eyes wide and terrified. Her feeble struggles were quickly fading as she gave way to shock, her disembodied sobbing seeming even louder in the sudden silence.

She snapped out of it, though, when the man began tugging her jeans down. She screamed without thinking. The man stopped his pawing at her to smack her again. This time her head hit the counter with a sickening crack. Her vision flashed red, then black, and suddenly everything faded away.

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a/n: So here it is, my very first Life With Derek fic. Would love feedback/reviews, so click the little button at the bottom of the screen! And I promise this fic will get cheerier. xP


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

"Casey? Casey! Casey, can you hear me?"

Casey opened her eyes with a groan. Her head was pounding, and the annoyingly familiar voice was far too loud for her liking.

"Of course I can hear you," she snapped. "What do you think you're doing?"

Derek Venturi's abnormally concerned face swam before her eyes. She blinked again and he came into focus.

He looked lost, his face pale from worry, and he was staring at her like he was afraid she was going to snap at any moment. That, in itself, was not that unusual, but the concern – and was that anger? – she saw on his face most definitely was.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" she asked.

She couldn't believe it, but Derek actually looked – dare she say it? – frightened at her question.

"Uh, Case," he said awkwardly. "Do you remember –"

He didn't get a chance to finish his question. Casey looked at him questioningly for all of half a second before everything came rushing back to her.

She blanched. It was a good thing that she was already laying on the kitchen floor, or Derek would have had to deal with a concussed sister among other things. Moments later, she was rocking back and forth with her arms wrapped around herself.

"Oh god, what happened? Where is he? Is he still here? What- what happened to me?"

It took Derek a few minutes to decipher what she was saying, obscured by sobs as all of her words were.

"He's in the pantry," he said, answering the first question he could understand.

Casey paled even further, something he had not thought possible. She began to tremble violently. Derek had to suppress the urge to hold her; she was Casey – she wouldn't want him to.

"Oh crap," he said as he saw she had misunderstood him. "No, he's unconscious. He can't hurt you."

By now Casey was curled up in ball and was pressed so tightly against the bottom of the counter he was surprised she hadn't melted into it. She looked pale and fragile, with her eyes darting back and forth like a trapped animal's. He was quick to reassure her.

"Relax, Case," he said, knowing she would do anything but. "He can't hurt you, I swear. I won't let him."

He thought her trembling decreased – by about .01 . She was still crying, too. He fought the urge not to cringe. If there was one thing he was a sucker for, it was a crying girl – it hit him like a punch in the gut. He blamed Marti for ruining his firm wall of manliness in the face of the fairer sex.

There was only one thing to do, he knew it. He sighed and gave in to the impulse he had been pushing back since he had first walked in.

He slid across the floor and moved closer to Casey, trying not to react when she flinched away from him. He pulled his jacket off and wrapped it around her before he wound his arms around her carefully and drew her to him, patting her shoulder awkwardly.

"It's okay, Casey," he said hesitantly. "_You're_ okay. I got in here before that bas –" he stopped mid-sentence before she lectured him for swearing. "Before that creep could do anything…before he could do anything else to you."

She shivered, her sobs quieting slightly.

"What happened?" she asked, her voice faint but no longer trembling.

He tried not to look surprised that she was speaking normally so quickly.

"I came home early," he said. He tried to make his voice sound as calm as possible, but inside he was seething with rage. "Alyson was an awful date. The girl kisses like a garbage disposal, it was like she was trying to rip my lips off my face and eat them."

Casey rolled her eyes. Only Derek could get sidetracked with details like that after what had just happened. He succeeded in his task though – she grinned.

"So I made up a phony excuse and ditched her. Sam called and said the rest of the team was at the rink for a scrimmage, so I came back here to grab my gear."

He paused. He really didn't want to say anything else, but he knew she wouldn't let it rest until she knew it all.

"And I could hear you. You were screaming and crying and…you probably know all that already. And then there was this thud and I couldn't hear anything else. So I grabbed my hockey stick from the closet and I ran into the kitchen and that fu – creep was standing over you with a video camera and he was about to…well, you know what he was about to do."

He paused again. This time Casey was less patient.

"And you did what, exactly?" she prodded, sounding much more normal. Her tone was colored with irritation. "You stood in the doorway and yelled? Your hockey stick showed sudden magical powers and beat him senseless for you? He saw the fear-inspiring sight of you in all your post-make out glory and decided to shove himself into the pantry?"

"No," Derek said shortly. He tried not to show how relieved he was that she was acting like…well, like Casey. "I kind of lost it, actually. The hockey stick did feel pretty magical, though. How'd you know?"

He grinned at her, and despite herself, despite knowing that this was not a time for jokes or petty sarcastic remarks, she grinned back.

"I had a feeling," she said lightly. Then her grin faded and was replaced by a much more serious expression. "Thank you."

He shrugged and tried to pretend he wasn't affected. It wasn't easy when he could still feel the red-hot fury rushing through his veins, the need to wrench open the pantry door and finish what he'd started. Scum like that didn't deserve to live, as far as he was concerned. Nobody could even think about doing that to Casey and expect to get away with it.

He pushed down the urge and looked down at Casey again.

"Ah, what else could I have done?" he asked nonchalantly. "No one gets to mess with you and get away with it."

Casey didn't respond, but she was suddenly extremely grateful to her stepbrother. He had saved her. It was ridiculous, she knew, to feel so shocked at the thought. She had always told herself that no matter how much he teased her, picked on her, and generally made her life miserable, he wasn't a completely terrible person. Still, it felt nice to know that he did care about her, that he would seriously injure her would-be rapist (her mind shuddered away from that word), and, more importantly, would get over his "phobia of crying females" to comfort her. It was that last part that most surprised her. She would have thought that he would call the police and then skulked off to the opposite side of the kitchen (or house) to wait.

That reminded her…

"Did you call the cops?" she asked.

The look her gave her was distinctly offended. "Of course I did. Do you really think I'd let that piece of shit get away with what he tried to do?"

She decided not to comment on his language. Besides, she could think of a few things she would like to call that man, too.

"I – uh, I wasn't sure if I should call Nora," he said hesitantly.

"Don't," Casey said quickly. "I don't want to ruin their night."

The glare she turned on him as she said this prevented him from saying anything. That was probably a good thing, he reflected. He couldn't seem like he cared about her too much.

The police finally showed up about ten minutes later. After they had taken Casey's still unconscious attacker out to the police car, a stout, older officer appeared and asked to speak with Derek in the living room while a kind-faced blonde woman remained in the kitchen to question Casey.

Derek answered the officer's questions tersely. He wasn't in the mood to sit around and play nice while Casey was in the other room. He should be in there with her. He tried not to think about why he felt so protective of her.

"So, son, you really did a number on your sister's attacker," the officer said.

"She's my step-sister and I'm not your son," Derek snapped.

The officer raised his eyebrows. "Easy now," he said. "I understand you're angry right now. I just need to make sure I get the whole story."

"What can't you understand?" Derek was all but shouting. "Casey was almost raped by some freak with a camera! You don't have to get a whole anything – feel free to take a few pieces of him to the lock up, whatever. Just keep him away from her."

The officer looked at him speculatively. "A camera?"

"Yeah. He had it on the counter across from them when I came in."

The officer nodded and wrote something down. "Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Venturi. It's a good thing your step-sister has someone like you looking out for her."

Derek nodded curtly. The blonde officer walked out of the kitchen with Casey following her. Derek could see she had the camera with her, tucked inside a plastic bag.

Derek did not miss the long looks the two officers exchanged before they left, leaving their cards on the coffee table with explicit instructions for their parents to call them as soon as they got home.

Casey avoided his eyes.

"So," she said, her voice overly perky. "I think I'll just go to bed now."

He didn't say anything, just watched her walk upstairs with an odd expression on his face. He wasn't worried about her, he told himself. That caring stuff was for Lizzie and Edwin, not him. He didn't care about Casey. Really, he didn't.

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**a/n:** So, I doubted I'd ever have a story popular enough in this category to need this, but...here's my standard update policy. On stories I'm winging it on (not this one) I update as soon as I'm done. On stories where I have chapters done ahead of time (this one), I'll wait either a week before posting or until I get 10 reviews. And, surprisingly enough, I actually got 10 reviews already! Woo hoo! Thanks, guys! And here's a hint, since you're all so cool. Read between the lines - there were two things mentioned in this otherwise very boring (compared to the others) chapter that'll turn out to be reeeaally important later on. One of them, right away - the other much later. See if you can figure them out. And again, review please!


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

"We're home, we're home!"

Marti's shout rang throughout the house, startling Derek awake.

He had fallen asleep in the recliner waiting for the rest of the family to come home. He knew without having to ask that Casey wasn't going to tell their parents what had happened. Normally he would have balked at having to take that responsibility on himself, but after the night she'd had he figured he could go easy on her, just this once.

Just this once, he reminded himself again as he stood up.

"Dad, Nora," he said. "Can I, uh, talk to you in the kitchen?"

George and Nora looked at each other.

"Derek," George said. "What did you do?"

Derek didn't crack a smile. He stalked off to the kitchen. Now curious, his father and stepmother followed him.

"Edwin, Lizzie, get out," he barked.

He waited until the sound of their stomping feet had drifted off before beginning.

"So, um, Dad, Nora," he said. He trailed off. He had no idea how to tell them something like this. He was _Derek_, for god's sake. He wasn't the kid who told people things with tact or anything. That was Casey's job. _Casey's_. Not his.

He opened his mouth to say something – anything, he wasn't sure what, just as long as it stopped his parents from staring at him like he'd lost his mind – when suddenly Nora shrieked. Derek spun around, half expecting to see the cruel face of the bastard who had attacked Casey, when he saw what had set her off.

She was pointing at the blood-spattered hockey stick with one finger, her hand flying up to her mouth.

"Uh, yeah, that was part of what I wanted to talk to you about," he said quickly.

Nora and George looked at him incredulously. Before they could say anything, Edwin and Lizzie skidded into the room.

Their eyes bugged out as they saw the bloody hockey stick Nora was still pointing at.

"Oh my god," Edwin exclaimed. "You killed Casey!"

"What?" Derek shouted.

"Don't be stupid, Edwin," Lizzie said, smacking her stepbrother on the arm. Then, to Derek. "You didn't, did you?"

"No."

"Oh, good. I mean, I didn't really think you would, because even you aren't that stupid, and Casey would probably kill you first, but it never hurts to be sure."

Derek, who had been nodding along with her at the beginning, stopped mid-head shake.

"What? You little…"

Lizzie ignored him, as usual.

"Derek," Dad said. "I'm sure you would never do something as drastic as kill your stepsister, but would you mind telling me what's going on around here?"

"You can't do anything right, can you?" a voice interrupted.

Casey stood on the threshold of the kitchen, wearing her thickest, hugest pair of pajamas even though it was an unseasonably warm night.

"What did you expect?" Derek shot back. "I'm no good at all these feelings and stuff. That's your job."

Casey rolled her eyes. "Real mature, Derek."

She turned to the rest of the family, who were eyeing her with unrestrained curiosity.

"While you guys were out," she said. "I had a pretty eventful night of my own. I finished my English essay – three days early, which might get me extra credit with Mr. Pearson if I bug him enough - , made a smoothie, got attacked by a crazed psycho that Derek had to beat off and shove in the pantry, painted my toenails, curled my hair…"

"What?" Nora shrieked, cutting her off.

"What?" George shouted, echoing his wife.

"What?" Edwin and Lizzie yelled together.

"What –" Even Marti? Derek was deeply disappointed, until – "Color did you paint your toes?" she finished interestedly.

"Passion pink," Casey said. "And if you're good tomorrow and don't bug me while I'm trying to do yoga, I'll let you borrow it."

"Casey, don't avoid the subject," Nora said. "You were _attacked_?"

"Yes," Casey shrugged. "But it's okay. I told you, Derek beat him off and the police have already been here."

"And put the crazy rapist in the pantry?" Lizzie said. She turned to Edwin. "You heard that, too, right?"

"There's a rapist in the pantry?" Edwin said. He backed up a few steps. "What are we still doing here? Someone call the cops!"

Derek reached over and cuffed his brother on the head. "We already did that, dweeb. Try listening once in a while."

"I will when you will." Edwin retorted.

"I'm starting right now," Derek said. "I'm gonna start by listening to your screams of pain you little -"

"Boys," George said sharply. "This is not the time."

"Casey, what happened?" Nora asked, moving over to her daughter. She didn't miss how Casey stiffened at her touch.

"Everything is fine," Casey said, sounding completely in control. Derek shot her a sardonic look. She ignored him. "The police will be in touch in the morning. Nothing happened, Derek actually acted like a decent human being – where's the bad?"

It didn't take a genius to see that both parents where far from convinced, but the phone rang, preventing any further discussion. Marti, who was the closest to the phone, answered it.

"Venturi-MacDonald residence," she sing-songed. "This is Marti, how can you help me?"

"It's "how may I help you?" Marti," Nora hissed.

Marti looked at her oddly. "Yeah – how can you help me?"

Casey shook her head. "All Derek's fault," she muttered.

"I heard that," Derek said.

"It's for you!" Marti shouted, louder than both of them.

The Venturis and MacDonalds looked at each other.

"Who?" they all asked.

"Hold on."

There was a pause as Marti conferred with whoever was on the other end of the line. After a moment, she held the phone out to George.

He took it with a mildly puzzled glance at his wife. Who would be calling at this time of night?

"Hello, this is George Venturi speaking, may I ask who is calling?"

There was an indistinct murmur, far too low for any of the shamelessly eavesdropping family to hear. However, the expression on George's face was enough to indicate that it was not good news.

"Are you sure?" he asked. Then, "Oh, wow. No, I certainly hadn't heard about that."

The conversation continued like that, with the rest of the family gleaning tantalizing tidbits of information in between trailing pauses and confusing half-sentences. It was enough for Derek to realize that he had been dead wrong when he thought that the person on the phone was giving his dad bad news. Oh, no, his dad's face had skipped bad news altogether and progressed on to oh-my-god-we're-screwed. End of the world bad; maybe even, no more hockey bad, which was downright cataclysmic to Derek's mind.

George's face was perfectly composed when he finally hung the phone up. Too composed; normally his dad's face was a little frantic – there were five kids to think of, which meant both parents always had the feeling that they were forgetting something (they usually were). Something wasn't right.

"Edwin, Lizzie, go to bed," George said. "And can you tuck Marti in, too?"

Edwin and Lizzie grumbled but did as they were told. George waited the full sixteen minutes it took them to tuck Marti in and retire to their own bedrooms (Derek knew, he counted), before he said anything.

"Casey, is there anything else you wanted to tell us?" he asked carefully.

Derek saw the expression on his father's face and recognized it immediately. It was the same expression he had worn when Derek had fallen out of the tree in the backyard when he was eight and had needed to be rushed to the hospital, and when Edwin gotten lost in the woods when they camping. He was terrified – and it was the special breed of fear that only family could inspire.

Derek watched his father's face carefully as Casey assured him that she hadn't left anything out, fear steadily building in his own heart.

Something was very wrong.

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**a/n:** Thanks for all the reviews guys! A lot of you had some really great guesses about the hints. And I've noticed some comments about the review standard that I thought I should clear up. I love reviews - they make me all shiny/happy inside. xP. But that's not the real reason for the standard. I rely on people's feedback to tell me what I'm doing right or wrong with a story. You guys are kind of like my focus group for the next chapter. And to me, you can't get a good idea of what people are thinking from one or two reviews. The reason I don't employ that policy with other stories is that the wait for those updates is so much longer that I usually end up getting enough feedback and time to critique the chapter on my own. So I hope that clears things up - and I hope you like the chapter!


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

"Would anyone care to tell me about a video camera that the police retrieved from our house around, say, four hours ago?" George asked, his voice deceptively innocent.

Derek glared at Casey. Oh no, he thought sarcastically. Leave it to Casey to forget a tiny, insignificant detail like that.

"_I_ suck at explaining things?" he hissed at her.

He tried not to let her know how worried he was feeling. If the police had called at - he checked the clock - three in the morning instead of waiting until later, it had to be bad, and on top of that, the fact that they specifically mentioned the camera couldn't be good, either.

"Shut up, Derek," Casey said, smiling tightly at her stepfather. To George – "So, they told you about that."

Derek felt like shaking her. How could she act so calm? Someone had attacked her just a few hours ago! He was still angry enough to hurt someone, why wasn't she?

"Yeah, they did, Casey," George replied. "Now, I don't want to know why you didn't – right now, anyway. It's been an incredibly rough night for you, for both of you, and normally I would just tell you both to get some rest before saying anything, but I think this is something that you have to know now."

Casey and Derek exchanged looks, and for once they weren't of the I'm-going-to-kill-you death glare variety. Truthfully, it hadn't crossed Derek's mind to think of picking on her today, for obvious reasons. He just wished that Nora would quit shooting him sidelong glances like he was suddenly about to start - he wasn't _that_ bad.

"Dad," Derek prodded. "Would you just tell us already?"

"Way to be subtle," Casey whispered to him.

"At least I said something. If we'd done it your way we would've been stuck here all night waiting for him to pull it together."

"You do know he can hear you," Nora interjected, amused despite the tense atmosphere.

"Thanks, honey," George said. "Casey, I don't know how to tell you this. I mean, what happened to you tonight was terrible enough, but," he said quickly as Derek cleared his throat pointedly. "I'm sure I can find a way without Derek kicking me in the shin."

Casey kicked Derek's foot away, and just like that, they were back to the death glares.

"Casey, someone is after you," George said.

For a long moment, no one said anything. It was like they had all decided to become statues. Three pairs of disbelieving eyes turned towards George, belonging to three pale, drawn faces.

"What do you mean?" Casey asked.

Derek usually lived for the few times when Casey truly lost her composure. The fact that those few times were almost always directly related to a prank of his making might have had something to do with that. Yet he had seen her look completely lost and panicked twice today and neither occasion had given him any satisfaction. Maybe it was because he was feeling so terrified, himself.

He tried to ignore the voice in his head that was telling him to take her and run somewhere far, far away where no one would be able to hurt her. He didn't think things like that. That stuff was for losers like Edwin and Sheldon Schlepper.

Just the same, he vented his frustration by trying to burn a hole in the countertop with his eyes and picturing Casey in a coconut shell bikini. Not that he thought she'd look good in it, or anything.

"That was the police," George said, dispelling all thought of coconut bras and surf boards from Derek's mind. "They've been questioning the man who tried to rape you."

Derek knew he couldn't have been the only one to notice how Casey flinched at that word, but George continued speaking anyway.

"He said that paid him to do it – the same person who gave him the camera. Whoever this person was, he was willing to pay a lot of money for it, as long as he got a tape of – of…"

George let the sentence hang. They all knew what he was getting at without having to see Casey flinch at hearing the actual word.

"He could be lying," Derek said at once. "Why would anyone believe someone like him?"

George shook his head. "I thought that, too, but the police are convinced he isn't. His story makes sense, too, sick as it is.

"He said he was at a bar downtown when "some guy" approached him with a duffel bag and an envelope of money. Whoever it was seemed out of place in the kind of dive he likes to hang out in, because according to Officer Cowan your attacker thought he looked "too snooty" to be somewhere like that."

"That doesn't prove anything," Derek said. "He's probably just a good liar. It's not that hard – I make things up all the time. That doesn't mean that anyone's after Casey."

"You haven't heard it all yet, Derek," George admonished. "The duffel bag had the camera – brand new, from the looks of it - , our address, a floor plan of our house, and pictures of Casey in it."

Casey's face lost what little color her nap had restored to it. She swayed and staggered backwards. Nora and Derek both reached out an arm to steady her, holding her sandwiched between them.

George nodded grimly.

"I have a stalker?" she said, her voice a strangled half-whisper. "Me? No, that's not possible. I'm not the one who gets stalkers. That's Derek's job. He's the one who has the crazy people following him around."

Derek wondered if he should be offended by that. He thought about it…Nah. It was kind of true.

It seemed everyone else thought it was true, too, because neither one of their parents commented on that.

"Casey, you need to calm down," Nora suggested.

Derek snorted. Calm down? Nora was acting a lot less calm than Casey was; her face was Casper pale and her voice falling somewhere between a shriek and a scream on the panic scale. It was a good thing this conversation didn't require much from him, or he would have sounded like that, too. He really didn't want to know what Casey would say if he suddenly sounded like Nora.

"I'm fine, Mom," Casey said. She sounded like it, too. Derek was beginning to think that her normal, put-together air was nothing more than a front. There was no way she could have gotten so good at acting so quickly. "Nothing bad is going to happen, so relax. I'm sure the police will catch whoever it is in no time."

Derek looked at her quizzically. Was she trying to jinx herself? She glared at him. He decided not to say anything. Even he wasn't insane enough to provoke Casey when she was in this kind of mood.

Nora looked unconvinced. "I'm still going to call a security company first thing in the morning."

Casey nodded. "That sounds good. You should go to bed now, though. Both of you have to go to work in about -" Casey looked at the clock. "Three hours."

The panicked expressions on their parents' faces where absolutely priceless. George practically fell over himself in his hurry to get what little sleep he could. Derek – who was in no hurry to leave Casey alone – was slower, slow enough to hear Nora stop and murmur to Casey.

"Casey, why are you doing this?"

Derek could practically see Casey shrug.

"Doing what? I'm not doing anything. Well, I'm standing here and breathing and talking and waiting for you to go to bed so you'll get up on time in the morning and not run around screaming for your keys and waking all the rest of us up."

"Casey, babbling isn't going to distract me. I know what you're doing, and it's not going to work. You can't bottle this up, too. This is serious."

"Mom, I know, okay. And I'm not bottling anything up. Seriously."

Derek could have laughed at the irony of it. Casey was practically the poster child for repression - and he had a bad feeling that he was going to be around when she blew.

"Casey…"

"You really should go to bed now. I'm not going to wake you up in the morning if you're late again."

Casey came out of the kitchen a moment later, shooting Derek an annoyed look.

"Eavesdropping, Derek?"

"Now what would give you that idea?" he asked, following her up the stairs.

"Oh, nothing – except you eavesdropping."

"Casey, Casey, Casey," Derek said, shaking his head. "I am astonished that you think so little of me, your own stepbrother. How could you?"

His only answer was the sound of her bedroom door slamming shut.

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**a/n: **Here's Chapter Four! I hope you enjoyed it! If I was titling the chapters in this story, I guess this one could have been called The Calm Before the Storm, Part I. And that was your hint of the day, guys. Want another one? Something big is going to happen around, say, Chapters Six or Seven? So stay tuned! And keep the reviews coming! 


	5. Interlude

**a/n: **In light of some of the Chapter Four reviews (and thank you all for those wonderful, wonderful reviews!), I've been spending some time reworking Chapter Five. But I felt bad for leaving you guys so long without an update, so I give you my very first interlude. This was actually the original beginning to the monstrously long Chapter Five, so I'm really interested in hearing what you have to think. Read, enjoy, and review!

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**Interlude # 1**

The locked door stared Derek in the face like some great monument to his failure, a permanent reminder that he couldn't get Casey to snap out of it.

He'd been trying for the past half hour to get her to talk, or at least to quit sobbing because it wasn't like the rest of them couldn't hear her too. The latter campaign had succeeded, but his only reward was the knowledge that she was probably just crying in her closet instead, or smothering the sobs with a pillow.

He couldn't believe it, but he was actually feeling compassion for Casey. Again. If the circumstances had not been so serious, he was pretty sure that Edwin would have been recording this to use as blackmail. Actually, Derek wasn't so sure that Edwin still wouldn't do that. The only difference was, this time he wasn't ashamed of it. Stalker trumps petty rivalry, even in his rather skewed moral book.

Eventually, though, he gave up. There were only so many things he could say to that irritating locked door of hers, and he had the feeling that if he didn't quit then he probably would have knocked it down and have to deal with angry parents on top of everything else. Besides, he had other priorities.

Derek stole down the stairs with all the silence of someone intimately familiar with his task; he had been sneaking around this house since he figured out how to unlatch the baby gates. It didn't take him long to find what he was looking for, namely two of his old hockey sticks. They were languishing in the back of the coat closet, surrounded by other odds and ends of the Venturi-MacDonald household that had been too out of the way to get auctioned off at the school fair. He couldn't help gloating at his luck. There was no way he would ever let Nora even think of selling his hockey gear, no matter how old it was. He might like her, but it was no where near the level of affection he had for his sport.

Hockey sticks triumphantly gained, he went back upstairs and crept into Marti's bedroom. Besides his own room, this was the one bedroom in the house he could navigate in the dark. He knew it all, from the discarded sweaters balled up behind the door (green, last week's "favorite" color) to the pile of stuffed ponies and coloring books stacked on top of her child-sized play table. He had spent more time in this room than in all his other siblings' combined.

He switched the hockey sticks to his right hand and held them high, out of the way of Marti's small form. Then he reached down and shook her awake, more gently than he would have had it been anyone else.

"Smarti," he whispered.

She mumbled something and pulled the covers over her head. He grinned in the dark. She really was his sister.

"Come on, Smarti," he said. "It's time to wake up."

"Smerek, it's dark," Marti said, finally opening her eyes.

"I know, but I promise you can go right back to sleep in a few minutes. Just come with me."

Marti moved to shake the covers off, but Derek placed a hand on her shoulder to stop her. He slung the hockey sticks over his shoulder and held them there with his chin, before grabbing the blanket off the bed with one hand, and taking hold of Marti with the other.

"We're going on an adventure," he whispered.

Even in the dark he could see the way her eyes lit up in excitement.

"Really?" she asked quickly. "What kind of 'venture?"

"Remember when we went camping?" he asked. "That summer right before you met Nora?" When she nodded, he continued. "Well, we're going camping again, only this time it's going to be right here in the hallway."

He felt her start to tug his hand, urging him to walk faster. There was a bit of quick thinking involved when he tried to maneuver through the door, the tilted hockey sticks and the fluffy comforter serving to make it an unwieldy task. Marti was giggling by the time they got into the hall, something that had to be stopped before she alerted the rest of the household to their "adventure."

"Shh, Smarti," he whispered quickly. "We've got to be quiet. It's all part of the adventure."

"It is?" Marti said doubtfully. "This sounds like one of Casey's adventures."

He pasted an offended scowl on his face.

"Are my adventures ever like Casey's?" he asked, pretending to be fierce.

Marti shook her head.

"This is a super-secret adventure," he told her, lowering his voice confidentially. "It's just for you and me to do. We're going to camp out here and protect everyone from the alien invaders."

Marti's eyes became so wide he was amazed they didn't just pop out of her face. It was no wonder she was so cute, though. After all, she was his sister.

Derek leaned the hockey stick against the wall by Casey's door and swung Marti onto his back.

"But first, Lieutenant Marti," he said. "The Venturi Hallway Space Cadets must retrieve the Protective Pillow Floor-Cushioners."

"Right, Captain Smerek!" Marti said, before remembering his command for quiet. She swiftly lowered her voice to a whisper. "I mean, right, Captain Smerek!"

Derek grinned, even though there was no one who could see it. With any luck, no one would be able to sneak up on them without going through him – and his "magical space hockey sticks" because even he had to admit that he was scrappy – first.

That pleasant thought was enough to keep the grin on his face as he snuggled up with Marti against Casey's door, the mission to retrieve the Protective Pillow Floor-Cushioners having been successful. He had no idea that someone else had heard the execution of the Venturi Hallway Space Cadets' first mission, despite his efforts to keep his voice down. But inside her bedroom, Casey MacDonald smiled through her tears.

Just when she'd thought things couldn't get any stranger…


End file.
